Senate Judiciary Committee chairman Arlen Specter went back on his word to Republican caucus members and conservative groups alike when he recently hired Hannibal G. Williams II Kemerer, who until recently was the NAACP's assistant general counsel

Kemerer was a protégé of Elaine Jones, who three years ago, as head of the NAACP Legal Defense Fund, lobbied Sen. Ted Kennedy to delay confirmation of many of President Bush's judicial nominees to a federal circuit court where her group had pending litigation.

Specter hired Kemerer to deal specifically with the nominations and vetting of federal judicial nominees, a position many conservatives were led to believe by Specter would go, at the very least, to a Republican, and most likely to a conservative.